Shakhrisabz - the Bathhouse

The bathhouse in Shakhrisabz is considered the oldest, older than the bathhouses of Bukhara and Samarkand. The interesting thing is that this bathhouse in Shakhrisabz is still in use, although it was built in the middle of the 15th century.  The construction of the bath is rectangular and starts at the top with a cloakroom for outer garments. Then, along the bath, with a total area of 22.5 x 15 metres, there are 4 rooms and the central room continues not only to the front but also along its 2 sides – two rooms to the front and one to the left, another to the right. All the rooms except the first are bathing rooms, only this first room is visible from the ground, the others are only visible with their domes, in fact they are dug into the ground to save heat and warmth. In the central, largest bathing hall, people took cold, warm or hot water from containers in front of the windows into copper basins and then changed to different rooms, some of them preferring hotter, others – cooler rooms. There they washed, rinsed, massaged each other or had themselves pampered by bath attendants. Water was supplied to the tanks by a crane that drew water from the well.

The walls and vaults of the baths were thickly covered with lime mortar, which had water-repellent properties, and consisted of fired square bricks. The floor was laid with marble and underneath was a dense network of heating ducts made of the same brick, up to half a metre diagonally.